CH K-Run's Park Me In First ("Uno") won last year's Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.
The owner of the winner of the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show lets PETA have it in the LA Times. This article is a response to a PETA demand that the USA networks stop showing Westminster. This debate is between two extreme positions.
I have already said that PETA has jumped the shark with their “Sea Kittens” campaign. They also have a vendetta against domestication, which is, sadly, not logical. But for domestication, dogs wouldn’t exist at all. Further, dogs have co-evolved with people. We need each other. We co-evolved.
PETA’s solution to ending domestication is to kill 97 percent of all dogs that enter its shelters. This position very obviously causes problems with the mainstream of the American body politic. What is worse is that PETA has used good science, science that people like me also use, to promote their views. That’s okay, but it seems rather bad that PETA gets to be the only promoter of these views in the media. And if the American people already have negative views of PETA, I am found guilty by association, even if it is that we merely used the same information.
However, Uno’s owner’s position is also extreme. This is what she said about the unhealthy conformation in some breed standards:
“Those are breed traits! Those breeds have always looked like what they look like. No, those traits come naturally when breeding dogs of the same breed…Peke to Peke produces all puppies that look like Pekes.”
No. Those so-called “traits” are exaggerated deformities. They are not natural in the least. Most pekes can’t even breathe properly. They can’t whelp or breed naturally. They are the result of “artificial selection,” not natural selection. They are not functional conformation either. Pekes don’t have any function other than to be held and cuddled.
So the media is able to set up a straw man using PETA as the main spokesperson for reforming the dog fancy. It is because PETA is the straw man, that I can’t even converse with some conformation breeders about breeding for greater diversity and a greater emphasis on health and working ability in the conformation standards. They will just say, “You’re one of those PETA extremists,” and the conversation ends.
The truth is I am not opposed to selective dog breeding or to breeding for some conformation, after all a dog does need good conformation to be a good working dog. However, the conformation shows have all become about glitz and glamour, finer points, and unusual mutations. It’s not about working function. (There are a few breeds that still have good working conformation as part of their standards, including the flat-coated retriever.)
Conformation is just one way of determining a dog’s quality. It must also have the working ability and temperament, and those breeders who focus more on those things deserve as much respect as the conformation breeders. Working ability, health, and temperament are still far more important than adhering to very finely delineated breed standards. But I’m not opposed to conformation judging, provided that this is the main focus of the show.
I would also like the closed registry system to updated to allow from some intelligent outcrossing. I don’t think we’re doing our breeds an service by maintaining closed registries, when we need to increase some genetic diversity in our breeds, just to make sure that genetic problems are less concentrated in our lines. I don’t think its possible to eliminate genetic diseases from dogs (Have we done so in people?), but greater genetic diversity prevents these disorders from becoming too concentrated.
Further, some of these breed classifications were originally quite arbitrary. I usually mention the golden/flat-coat split, which was originally on color alone. But there’s also the cain terrier/West Highland white terrier split, which was alson on color. The Norwich/Norfolk terrier split, which was on ear carriage (and that’s still pretty much the only difference). And there are certainly others. These are the breed splits with which we could use some intelligent outcrosses.
These are modest proposals, designed to work with creating a better dog fancy with healthier dogs. It is not PETA extremism. It is simply better animal welfare. PETA wants to destroy the dog. I want to save it, and that’s the difference.
PETA does not speak for me, and if PETA and I agree on something, it will be by accident.
A great post. And honestly I couldn’t agree more on your views on conformation and breed registries. I would like to add the need for better health checks in breeding programs – also mandated by the registries themselves.
Yes, we need mandated health checks, especially when we’re doing one of those intelligent out-crosses.
Please educate me. I understand the concept of out-breeding, but are you saying we should outcross to a similar breed? Like the FCR/Golden cross? If that is the case, I don’t understand how it could help. Both breeds have many of the same health problems, and for years breeders have selectively bred to get rid of the nuisance obscure yellow gene that produces the rare, yet unacceptable to breed standard, yellow flatcoat. I believe it is how Goldens were created. If that is not what you meant, can you elaborate on possible out-crosses and how control can be maintained to study pedigrees.
I’m talking about two issues.
1. Goldens and flat-coats come from the same stock. Goldens and flat-coats have the same important sires from Zelstone to Don of Gerwn. They were interbred until 1916. Yellow was an accepted color for flatties in 1908, and that’s where goldens were registered. All goldens were registered as yellow flat-coats from 1908-1916. But even before that, they were interbred heavily. One line, the Culhams, bred by Lord Harcourt, were so interbred with flat-coats that puppies from the same litter were registered as separate breeds. It was stupid of the golden people to split off from the flat-coat, but they did for a very stupid reason. Some people started a rumor that goldens were Russian circus dogs. I think some of this may have had to do with some degeneration in flat-coats around this time, but I’m not really sure.
2. Both breeds have the same health problems, but there are lines of golden that don’t get cancer at an early age. Further, the golden has been bred away from a working retriever’s conformation, but the flat-coat still has it. The only choice field golden breeders have as their lines get more inbred is to breed with the show dogs, which winds up creating dogs with really poor conformation for work. If they were able to add flat-coat genes to them, it would be a smart move.
Yes both breeds have similar problems, but breeding them together can reduce the likelihood of them occurring, but some could crop up.
I think a better solution is to do what the Europeans do with Groenendaels (Belgian sheepdogs) and Tervurens. They are interbred and registered according to phenotype, but Groenendaels can have Terv puppies. On rare occasions, recessive blacks can be born in Terv litters and these are registered as Groendaels.
The only reason to outcross similar breeds is to not totally destroy type and make it impossible to return to a dog that looks like the parent breed.
In beef cattle, a black angus (Aberdeen Angus) cow can have Hereford ancestors. I think it has to be bred to Angus for several generations (I think 3) before it can be called an Angus.
Actually, you can use two EXTREMELY different breeds and still return to breed type if you are very careful and understand the genetics involved in the characteristics of each breed. See the Corgi/Boxer crosses:
http://www.steynmere.com/ARTICLES1.html
That’s very true. I was working on a post on the tailless boxers, but I thought that it would be too radical for what I’m suggesting. It’s a lot easier to do it with breeds that have a common ancestry and appearance, and it may be all that KC’s will be willing to grant right now.
There aren’t many genes separating breeds at all, and that study proves it. I remember going through it a few years ago when I did have a boxer cross. She had a long whip-like tail, as did the old-type bulldog from which she partially descended.
Now, what I’m suggesting is that if you cross related breeds that look alike then you’ll be able to sort of get some support. But even there, you’re not guaranteed. They crossed pointers with Dalmatians a few years back to make them not have the kidney stone issues, and none of these dogs has been registered.
The reason why we need cross-breeding– and you must know the health and genetics of the outcross stock– is that you add some more cards to the deck, which you are trying to shuffle away from a card that carries a genetic defect. If you don’t know the heritage, you will introduce those genes and other bad things into the cards.
I believe the backcross Dals are registered with the UKC.
That doesn’t surprise me. That’s the dog registry that will adopt the open registry system first. They already allow mixed breeds to compete in their obedience and agility trials.
It all sounds good and I would be willing to try something like that eventually. I love the study of genetics and I’m a bit of a rebel. But I can’t see the AKC accepting anything like this for a very long time. They continue to allow new breeds, but probably wouldn’t allow this to improve the ones we have. I can only hope that with research we can clear up some stuff in the lines we have.
The thing is I suspect that a lot of breeders of all sorts of breeds are “rebels.” They just sort of keep quiet about things because of how the fancy operates.
I wonder if maybe trying to influence the UKC first might cause some changes to happen. The UKC is very much in favor of greater genetic diversity, and it’s the main rival of the AKC as a registry. Virtually all coonhounds registered today come from that registry.
Also, as for yellow flat-coats, it might even be a good idea to use the yellow culls from that cross-breeding to solve some of the golden retriever’s problems.
Why not start with the rare yellows born as FCR’s. They can be registered with AKC and can compete in every venue but conformation. But I think it might be easier to deal with the owner of such a dog. As for the UKC, my son bred Treeing Walker Coonhounds, and I found their registry to be very loose. My son was conscientious and had DNA testing done to back his records.
It is a loose registry.
The Treeing Walker was originally a line of American foxhound. Most show varieties of American foxhound are actually Walker line hounds. There are several other lines called Trigg and PennMaryDel, to name just two others. All of these were in the same registry with English foxhounds, English coonhounds (redticks), and Treeing walkers. The UKC originally had a studbook like this, and it is loose for that very reason. The breed was registered by the UKC as the English fox and coonhound.
It’s only through selective breeding for tree dogs that they ever split off of that foxhound soup. They are Walker line American foxhounds that can tree. My neighbors have walker coonhounds, but my grandpa has walker fox hounds. They are very similar in appearance but they hunt very differently.
The UKC registry is designed to be loose, and you aren’t the first person to say this. It’s one of their flaws, but they mainly register working dogs. Their top registered breed is the Walker coonhound, not the Labrador.
Yellow flat-coats are a good place to start with this. There was an experimental outcross in boxers with Pembroke Welsh Corgis that have no tails, so they could breed a line of Boxers that were naturally tailless. The boxer used for the original outcross was a white boxer (not a deaf one). These boxers without tails are now registered with the KC and FCI.
UKC is working with the Chinook people on their cross-breeding project.
http://www.chinook.org/xbreeding.htm
You might also be interested in Jeffrey Braggs message board. Very little traffic but there are some decent threads there.
http://21st-century-dogs.com/21st-century-dog-breeds/phpBB3/
The Germans do not consider the Boxers with Corgi in them to be Boxers and changed the standard (which is also the FCI standard, as Germany is the COO for Boxers) to DQ a ‘naturally stumpy’ tail. The funny thing is that plenty of Boxers with Corgi in their background DO have a long tail. Those dogs would not be DQed.
I heard that they were FCI recognized, but Germany refusing them is the killer.
Well, I think Boxers look fine with tails.
That Chinook program is exactly what I’m suggesting.
Genetic diversity only works if it is allowed to flourish in any breed of dog. The benefits of such diversity cannot be reaped by us unless we acknowledge that the differences that go beyond the standards put in place by our aristocratic ancestral snobs (sorry, but there is more truth to this than not) only hurt the future generations by promoting the culling of otherwise healthy animals and thus removing the diversity they offered from the breeding stock. Limiting the breeding stock due to bias of color or other traits is basically funneling the breed towards it’s own demise. Or we just have to accept that certain purebred dogs based off of the breed standards just live shorter lives. I don’t want to accept this.
FCR’s come in yellow. And they look nothing like Goldens. Yes there are similarities but generally speaking they are so different that the only thing that makes people call them Goldens is the color of the hair. Even the field working Goldens are similar… yet different. My neighbors have red and chestnut field working Goldens that often play with our flatties and although they do appear similar they are just a bit off with the shape of the skull and the body size. Sure, they’re not as beefy as a show Golden, but certainly stockier that a Flattie. Even my largest flattie, who is a mutant by the standards, pushing 90+ lbs, is a sleeker and racier dog. Flat out on the farm its the FCRs leading the charge on flyball 100% of the time.
We now have our Yellow Flattie. He comes from a very sound lineage and his parents were Black FCR’s. Some of his littermates were also yellow. Some were Black and some were Liver. He seems to be a Liver with yellow trait. Since his pads lips and nose are tannish to brown like my liver female. Whereas his yellow littermates were solid black accents. Maybe for us…we’ll see some longevity come of his progeny. Being that the FCR fancier community has already ostracized us from the very beginning. We’ll see if we can just make our own mark by suddenly offering wonderful dogs that live just a bit longer. ;-)
And here’s another early dog: https://retrieverman.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/culham-brass-19041.jpg
In goldens and flat-coats, the goal was to breed out the Newfoundland influence. In Flat-coats that remained the goal. It was succeeding in goldens, but then they thought the bear like appearance was cute, so they stopped.
There are goldens that are built just like flat-coats, though probably not as racy as some of the really lightly built flat-coats.
The golden has been ruined because of breeding for excessive bone, which I’m sure is affecting field lines now, because of the illusion of producing a dual purpose dog and because field breeders have to use show lines as outcrosses.
When you talk about Belgian Shepherds, there are additional acceptable crosses. Groen with Terv, as you discussed. In addition, Tervs can be crossed with Malinois, and Malinois can be crossed with Lakenois. Terv-Laken crosses are discouraged because it can be difficult to tell whether the coat is wire or long on some. Mal-Groen crosses are not done because there is no place to slot a shorthaired black dog — is it a “defective” shorthaired Groen or a “defective” black Malinois?
UKC and Canadian Kennel Club both have Belgian Shepherds of 4 varieties that can interbreed within limits. I think AKC is the major player with separate breeds. Politics will keep them apart until AKC is hit with fairy dust and starts to rethink a lot of things. Right now they’ve told the breed clubs that they can recombine into one breed; however, they’d have to form a single parent club and only one representative would enter the Group ring — no carrying the Variety thing that far. People being what they are, none of the parent clubs is anxious to let one of the others take over their breed and finances.
Some of the other varieties have concerns about what else the Malinois may have been crossed with for police work in eastern Europe and don’t want that “tainted” blood introduced to their varieties.
And that’s why I specifically chose those two, because they are a controlled outcross. I’m not talking about indiscriminate breeding.
The Lackenois bred to a coated Shepherd would ruin the dogs. I’ve seen black Malinois, and I know that they hate it.
Also, the reason why it’s hard to tell the difference between short-haired and wire-haired dogs is that often get what’s called a broken coat. In German pointers, there are wire-hairs and short-hairs, and very rarely you find what’s called a broken-hair. They aren’t interbred right now, but the interbreeding creates this broken hair. The only breed that has an acceptable broken coat is the Jack Russell.
Also, the Dutch shepherd has been interbred with Belgian shepherds heavily. I’ve seen brindle Malinois that are very clearly the result of crossing with Dutch shepherds.
You know what that fairy dust is? Competing registries (not the Continental Kennel Club, a paper mill for the puppy mill industry) and an angry body politic of dog fanciers. The AKC is losing registrations.
And in the UK, you really do have a ticked off dog fancy. People are at war with each other over breed standards. It’s not like here, where breed standards came down with Moses from Mt. Sinai. But that’s changing.
I’m not against conformation breeding, provided it is designed to complement the needs for health and working ability. And there are some breeds that have really good standards.